PARK AN D ,C EM ETERY. 
67 
SOME THINGS AN IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY CAN DO 
Every community should organize a 
civic improvement society or the city 
beautiful club, with officers and com- 
mittees for work, and as few rules as 
possible. Volunteer societies often 
are overwhelmed by the rules, there 
being so many instructions to follow^ 
that the members get discouraged at 
the start. It is better to have but 
one or two rules, the chief one being 
that the member will devote some 
time personally to furthering the pur- 
pose of the society. If we can get 
25 or 30 persons united in an effort 
to improve their towm, there will be 
set in motion a force that w'ill produce 
results most surprisingly. 
Do not undertake too much; that is 
another good rule. Failure weakens 
future effort. Therefore, in the days 
of inexperience, undertake the simple 
thing that can be accomplished. Suc- 
cess will breed success, and, before 
long, the society will find itself able 
to cope with matters of great pith and 
moment. 
Clean sidewalks. That will do for 
the beginning. In some towns the 
inhabitants are commanded by ordi- 
nance to have their sidewalks swept 
daily before a certain hour; and the 
society can use its influence to get the 
ordinance enforced; or, if there is no 
ordinance, can get an ordinance of 
that sort adopted; or, if this be not 
considered advisable, can urge upon 
the citizens to use the broom, the 
members of the society setting the 
good example. 
Next is clean streets. The first 
thing the society member will do is 
to refrain from putting waste paper 
or domestic refuse into the streets; 
but will provide a box or receptacle 
for the waste. If the town has no 
garbage removal system, influence 
should be brought to bear on the 
council to have one established. It 
will do more than any one other thing 
to keep the streets clean. 
Then one’s own premises. Put the 
lawn in order, cleaning up both back 
and front yards, mending fences, re- 
setting gates, and making liberal use 
of paint and whitewash. There is a 
fashion in these things. If all neglect 
[Extract from an address before the Alabama 
Commercial and Industrial Association, 
by Erwvi Craighead^ of Mobile.) 
outward appearances, that is their 
fashion ; but if a considerable number 
of people tidy up their yards, gardens, 
fences, and outhouses, we may be sure 
that this too will become the fashion, 
especially if the movement be a con- 
certed one. 
The public buildings found usually 
in small towns are of a certain archi- 
tectural pretention, but, almost with- 
out exception, they are unkempt, their 
bare floors unscrubbed, their walls 
dingy with the dust of years, their 
furniture old and badly in need of re- 
pair. The stain of tobacco juice is 
seen everywhere. Cold and cheerless 
in winter, ill-ventilated and stuffy in 
summer, they are precisely what they 
ought not to be; and they would not 
be suffered to exist but for the fact 
that the ueople do not know of any- 
thing better and have no expectations 
of ever knowing anything better. 
Here is where the club could do ef- 
fective work, cleaning, pdinting, and 
repairing. There is really no reason 
why the court house should not be 
the show building of the town. 
The public grounds also are much 
neglected. There is no need of hav- 
ing a fence around them if the cows, 
goats, horses and hogs are kept in re- 
straint by a good pound law; but 
there is usually a fence, and it is 
broken in part and is bare of paint. 
Have the fence taken down; trim the 
trees, mow the grass, strew the walks 
with sand or crushed shells, place 
benches here and there, make the 
place clean, and at the same time 
beautiful. If there is means at hand, 
attempt landscape gardening; it will 
serve as an object lesson to the citi- 
zens and will cause imitation. 
Treating of the beautiful, as distinct 
from the question of cleanliness, let us 
consider the trees. Shade trees on the 
streets are quasi-public property. In 
some cities they are cared for by the 
administration. Generally speaking 
they are not cared for at all. The 
property owner ])Iants them. If they 
grow, they grow; if not, not. And 
they can grow as they please. Under 
those conditions there are trees in 
clumps, some trees well proportioned, 
others sickly or out of shape; and 
there are many spaces that are devoid 
of trees. The duty of the club will 
he to hold tree meetings, to have a 
tree planting day, to obtain advice as 
to the best trees to be planted, and the 
best way to care for them; and, if pos- 
sible, to obtain the services of an ex- 
pert to direct the work. Some cities 
are famous for their trees. S'mie 
other cities and towns are as bare and 
shadeless as the desert. How little 
effort is needed to emulate what is 
good and productive of beautifying re- 
sults ! 
A most unbeautiful thing is the pos- 
ter advertising in towns where no or- 
dinance controls the placing of the 
posters. These advertisements, even 
when new, are obtrusive; when old 
and tattered, they are very ugly. Let 
influence be used to get an ordinance 
limiting the placing of such advertise- 
ments and absolutely forbidding the 
placing of them upon the. sides of 
stores, barns, outliouses or dwellings. 
In St. Louis all out-of-door advertise- 
ments are placed upon boarding es- 
pecially erected for the purpose and 
are painted — no pasted posters being 
allowed. A small town cannot expect 
to adopt such a rule as this, but it can 
regulate the advertising so that it will 
not become a public nuisance: and this 
special rule can lie adopted and en- 
forced, that the persons who put up 
an advertisement shall take it down or 
have it taken down before it becomes 
an eyesore. The club can do a great 
deal to bring about a right public 
opinion in this respect; especially can 
it urge upon property holders the im- 
propriety of letting patent medicine 
men, whisky sellers, circus and theat- 
rical com])auics use their fences, out- 
houses, etc., for the display of their 
advertisements. 
There are many opportunities for 
activity in the small town. The school 
house is usually an unornamental 
structure, bare of comfort or coiive- 
tiience ;md set in a great empty si)acc, 
called the school yard. How shall the 
